


Time (like the ones in my skin)

by Lilac_Nightshade



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff and Angst, M/M, More characters to be added, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-28
Updated: 2014-05-05
Packaged: 2018-01-21 04:05:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1536863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilac_Nightshade/pseuds/Lilac_Nightshade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>00yrs 00mths 00days 00hrs 00mins 00s</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Brenda, this is for you. Happy birthday and may you have many more feels in the future 8D
> 
> Loosely-based on this: http://illness-and-instruments.tumblr.com/post/3139087743/timer-2009-if-a-clock-could-count-down-to-the
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters mentioned, except for the balding RA hahas OwO

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was cliché, that the fact that his Soulmate would be his new roommate, but he supposed it could not be helped as he fished around the pile on his desk for the pack of crisps he abandoned earlier, waiting for the resident advisor to bring the transfer student from America here.

His wrist gave an involuntary shudder, causing him to drop the chips back into the bag. He sighed and went for the pink Pocky box instead.

Phantom shivers, they called them, the random series of shivers and trembles that travel up your dominant wrist and run straight down your spine as your Time started dropping numbers to

_00yrs 00mths 00days 00hrs 00mins 00s_

Even those who Erased their Time were not immune to it. Kisechin, who Erased his Time due to his modelling work requirements, told him that the first time he saw his Kasamatsucchi, he was so shocked by the phantom shivers that he toppled off the bench, and, to the horrors of his prowling fangirls, was promptly kicked in the back of the head by said bad-tempered senpai.

Now, nibbling on the Pocky that Kisechin have given him after yet another Pocky advertisement, he sneaked a look at his wrist, suddenly after afraid that the numbers would stop dropping and revert back to the default

99yrs 99mths 99days 99hrs 99min 99s

as if he really cared about meeting his Soulmate.

Maybe, he _was_ a little curious, just a little bit.

Ever since he started playing basketball in Teikou, his Time started dropping numbers, like the trickling sand in an hourglass. It had always been that way; his Time would drop whenever he attended practice or played in matches, then stop whenever he stopped. Even when he started ditching practices out of boredom, his Time dropped whenever he was supposed to be practising or playing basketball.

Was his Soulmate so attracted to basketball that it would affect the string of fate that inexplicably linked them together? People like that made him curious, made him angry and disgusted because he hated the fact that they could hold so much passion for the sport and it would never work; they would never progress to his standard.

He hated the fact that he, one of the Generation of Miracles; codenamed the Sleeping Dragon, later the Unbreakable Center; succeeded and even _improved_ so easily and effortlessly, as if getting better was like a walk in the park, just because of his too-long bones and uncanny talent.

He hated their disappointed faces, their dejected tears, their eventual absence from the basketball club.

 

_(Because he knows that he wasn’t worth the talent, he who shoot hoops after hoops with half-assed conviction, could still make the effort flawless, while people like Kurochin probably had never shot a hoop in his entire life, despite his burning love and passion for the game._

_And he is really, really confused why it happened this way, because he was always told that success comes from 99% hard work and 1% talent and maybe he had always conveniently left out the last 1% and really believed that one could succeed with hard work alone and he hated the fact that_ he  _was destroying this belief by existing to play basketball._

_He never really understood why such a bum like him was granted with such a talent that became a curse.)_

 

Maybe, he was just a tad bit lonely, being high up of his pedestal constructed from sweets and long bones and basketball; maybe he was lonely enough for these past 16 years to want someone who was not talented but on par, someone who had the authority to tell him that _it is alright to eat sweets, it is alright to have this talent, you don’t have to feel guilty—_

His reprieve was only broken because there was no more pink sugar-coated biscuit sticks left in the box and the fact that he has roughly 3 minutes left before his Soulmate appears.

It was cliché, that the fact that his Soulmate would be his new roommate, but he supposed it could not be helped as he fished around the pile on his desk for the pack of crisps he abandoned earlier, waiting for the resident advisor to bring the transfer student from America here.

It would be any time now, as he watched the number trickle down the number line as the numbers slid up into nothingness before being replaced by a number that was smaller by one. Watching the numbers change was mildly hypnotising and calming, though he really had nothing to be nervous about. He briefly considered cleaning his room up, but his side of the room was not untidy as much as it was _empty_ ; his books tucked away into stacks and arranged onto bookshelves neatly, clothes were sorted into drawers after he collected his laundry this afternoon, and even the remnants of snacks that became a small pile on the study table was hardly unsightly. All was fine...maybe except for that one towel slung over the back of his chair because he was a lazy bum after he showered this morning and it was too much of a bother to stand up right now to hang the towel where it was supposed to be.

Two sharp knocks bounced against the walls and echoed throughout the room, before the door opened with a muffled greeting to reveal the balding, but nevertheless, good-natured RA, leading a shorter (but everyone was shorter) male student with black, stylish hair and a pretty fringe that framed his left eye and a mole on the edge of his right eye, with a chain necklace that hung a ring at the end, resting against his chest. A shiver ran down his spine as they made eye contact, the stranger later crinkling his eyes and giving him a friendly smile, a tremble shook his knees as he stood and shuffled over for introductions after being prompted by the RA and a quiver trickled up his arm as he shook hands with Himuro-kun as the numbers finally dried up, but he made sure that he did not show them.

Even when Himuro stopped the RA from berating Murasakibara-kun about the towel by oh-so-naturally picking it up and hang it over his arm, as if he had done it a million times, with a casual, “Don’t worry, I’ve got it,” and the RA had already left the room and the door had closed and there was no one else but him and his—his and inexplicably his—Murochin and his sweets, he did not say anything, did not breathe a word about the expired Time etched into his skin on his dominant wrist that was hidden behind an exercise band, the number permanently fixed now, at

 _00yrs 00mths 00days 00hrs 00min 00s_                 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things to clarify:  
> Time is the series of numbers that will be displayed upon your dominant hand's wrist to tell the time left before you meet your Soulmate. The default is the (rubbish) numbers with all the 9, if that wasn't clear (;-;)
> 
> Erasing a Time means to surgically remove the display of numbers from the wrist.
> 
> RA is resident advisor in short form. A resident advisor is sorta the teacher-in-charge of dorms and stuff (please correct me if I'm wrong, I don't live in a dorm yet so I just Googled this up hahaha ha ha (>///


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was just like that, no questions asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meeeeeps and so I finally updated hurhur /hides

Somehow, he was not surprised when he finally asked Murochin about joining Yōsen’s basketball team, and he turned him down with a sad little smile, unconsciously fiddling with the ring that he wore fastidiously around his neck every day.  

He knew intuitively, upon first sight, that the ring was bad news. It was not so much as he was jealous that someone gave his Murochin an object of such sentimental value _(maybe he was jealous, a little bit, and suddenly the digits inked on his wrist felt so heavy and they burned into his skin)_ , but it was the fact that he knew the ring was giving Murochin grief; the ring was an unpleasant reminder of _something_ that he might or might not be burning to know, because he had seen the older male on some sleepless nights, eyes wide, just gripping the ring so tight in his fist as rebellious salty water escaped the confines of his pained, determined eyes.

He thought he did a good job at stealth and that his quiet, nightly observations

_(it wasn’t as if he could help it; he couldn’t sleep unless he was certain that the raven-haired boy had finally closed his eyes in slumber, his heart filled with a sort of anxiety as he silently willed the other to stop being a hypocrite, so that they can both “sleep early because we have school tomorrow”, or “sleep early because Atushi has a match tomorrow”)_

had gone undetected, until the night (day?) when Murochin whispered from across the narrow width of the space that separated their beds, “Atsushi, I know you aren’t sleeping,” and he instantly gave up on trying to pace his breathing _(breathing around Murochin seemed harder and harder nowadays)_ and opened his stark violet eyes to stare unblinkingly at the huddled figure on the bunk bed opposite his, unrepentant.

After what it felt like a century, Murochin had said, “Let’s go play basketball.”

That was how their relationship began to move from the quagmire that they had insisted to be stuck in, Murasakibara with his silence and Himuro with his fake, fake smiles. Murochin never asked him for a one-on-one whenever he had a match or a test tomorrow, or whenever he had fallen asleep at the study table, nestled within snack wrappers and Pocky boxes, only to wake up to a clean table with a warm blanket draped over his shoulders. Atsushi never questioned why whenever the other asked for a one-on-one, not even to complain that he was too lazy. It got to the point where his basketball earned a permanent spot by the foot of his bed, because Murochin would ask politely, and the resulting actions of _get up, stretch, grab basketball_ ran like clockwork.

He realised he was right; Murochin was really good and graceful at basketball, and he could see the devotion still sparkling in his eyes, and his heart had dropped like a deadweight, a reminder of the the fact that he was right, his Time was right and Murochin was that basketball-obssessed Soulmate, _his_ basketball-obsessed Soulmate. It was him who perfected, and even named Murochin’s Mirage Shot, even though it was not like he would be using it in a match or anything.

He had only ever asked once; it was after Murochin finally broke his defense with the Mirage Shot, and their eyes mirrored the wild look that they shared, as the numbers burned themselves into his skin and were so, so heavy; it was not a question, it was a statement. “Join the basketball team.”

Murochin went to retrieve the ball, breaking the comfortable eye contact and gave the ball back to him, smiling gently, not-so-fake-but-still-counterfeit, “No, I won't.”

He never asked again.

* * *

They would go for walks after their late night basketball sessions; long ones on weekends that lasted till 3am, short ones just around the dorm compound if there was school tomorrow; but always, they end at the Family Mart nearest to their dorm room with Atushi buying snacks; boxes of Pocky, Umaibo sticks, packets of Nerunerunerune; and Atsushi would eat at least one-quarter of the loot, but Murochin would never complain, only gently pushing the taller into the bathroom and squeeze toothpaste on his (childishly) purple toothbrush.

It was natural that they would fall in step with one another; going for the same classes, eating lunchboxes prepared by Murochin in the homeroom at their desks, wedged into a corner of the class, side by side, leaving for extra-curricular activities once the bell rang; Murochin had extra Japanese literature and history classes in the library on Mondays and Fridays while Atushi went for basketball practice, and on Wednesdays, Murochin would walk Atushi to the gym and then head for the Red Cross club room for the weekly First Aid training courses and club meetings. At 6pm, it was customary to see Murochin waiting for Atushi to finish practice on the bleachers, and then they would walk back to the dorms together.

Atsushi never once asked Himuro to play, even though he knew the elder played so beautifully _(he hated to use the word_ breathtaking _but sometimes, watching Murochin play was enough to make him forget how to breathe)_ , his poise and forms perfectly mastered and executed, accentuated by the dim lights of streetlamps thankfully near the streetball court, framed by the long shadows that splayed out over the cemented ground.

He never asked why, because it felt like a taboo subject that would make Murochin’s smile revert back to the cheerful falsity. However, over the course of time, in rare moments of retrospection, Himuro started revealing bits and pieces of his past with Murasakibara listening quietly, the mild cracking and chewing noises providing a comfortable background noise. Murasakibara never asked, but one night, after the echoes of a bouncing basketball had long faded out, Himuro told him everything; about America, about Taiga, about the ring, about Alex, about basketball.

“...and that’s why I stopped playing basketball. Despite all I’ve said, I didn’t want to lose my brother. I have no one else left.” Himuro concluded with a bittersweet, but finally, a _true_ smile _(he felt like trash because it was a really a relief to see him smile)_ , setting the ball down gently by Murasakibara’s foot.

_You have me._

Murasakibara only nodded sagely, biting off half of the Umaibo to chomp on thoughtfully, then offered half the other half to the now-sullen elder sitting on the concrete floor. Himuro accepted out of reflex with a baffled expression, but Atsushi did not waste time as he took the other’s left arm to hang the plastic bag full of Family Mart snacks.

It was not a question, it was a statement. “But Atushi only ate half of one Umaibo.”

A pause, before a flat “Sleepy.” pierced the silence to make way for the tall child ambling across the court, this time a basketball in hand instead of snacks.

They flowed into a natural rhythm encompassing one another, with no pretense or exaggerated closeness. It was just like that, no questions asked. To Murasakibara’s relief, both of them were equally reluctant to discuss about Time, and thus it was not a problem at all that they had not shown each other their Times; Atsushi was always wearing an exercise band over his wrist, while Murochin, a relatively large, black, stylish watch; not even when the Winter Cup approached.

_(It is not love, not exactly, but Murasakibara cannot fathom a life with Murochin._

_He can live like this forever.)_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some clarification (before I get bashed):  
> Yes, in this fic Murochin would not be in the basketball team (YET shhhhh) because canon divergence. (._.) Don't ask me why I just decided that it would be fun to make him not play basketball officially gomen gomen  
> I'm not sure how sports clubs and other clubs fit their activities into the school schedule in Japan, but for my school, these activities are always conducted after lessons have ended for the day.
> 
> Thanks for all the kudos! I really appreciate them *\\(^_^)/*
> 
> P.S: There a meaning behind all the name changes (e.g Atsushi-Murasakibara and vice versa). I did not plan to end this chapter like this sorry /mushrooms away


End file.
